II
by Ivory
Summary: *Revised*It's been 4 years since they had last seen the Shi Jin Ten Chi Sho, until Yui discovered Ashitare in the real world. From there everything fell apart....
1. Disclaimer, Warnings, and Acknowledgemen...

Disclaimer: I dun own Fushigi Yuugi. Shocking, ne? Also, I dun own any of the song clips, I pay respects to the people who sing them at the end of each chapter.  
  
Warnings: Adult Language, Violence, Lots 'O Spoilers, & Characters acting more than a bit OOC (Out Of Character{as in unusual behavior, wildly out of their normal personality}).  
  
Acknowledgments: I know Yui doesn't have the mouth of a sailor. And I've toned it down, but the wonderfully colorful language still pops up. And I probably made Taka a little bit more uncaring than usual, and Shun-chan has changed, but I kinda explain that in Perfect Blue. And I completely rewrote Perfect Blue(Ch. 1) some parts are the same, but if you don't read all of it you might get confused. May not, who knows.  
  
Oh and I'm gonna try to have different people tell the story each chapter!  
  
Er...I think I'm done now.~_^  



	2. Perfect Blue

II  
  
Perfect Blue  
  
Scars are souvenirs that you never lose  
The past is never far  
Did you lose yourself out there?  
Did you get to be a star?  
And don't it make you sad to know that life,  
Is more than who we are?  
  
Once upon a time my life was perfect. I was on my way to high school, I was smart, pretty and popular. Everything a girl could want right? Right. Facing my parents over a low "C" was about as scary as it got. Not that they'd really care all that much if I got an "A+++" if it's at all possible. But that's not the point. They wanted my grades to stay in the rang to where I could get a scholarship and they wouldn't have to pay all that much to get me away to college. Loving, ne? But that's normal, right? Okay so maybe you wouldn't   
exactly want your child to live in that type of rather uncaring environment. But lemme tell you, after all the hell I've been through, that kind of life is so sugar sweet it rots the teeth.   
  
Anyway, life was wonderfully bliss. Heh, thanks to the Shi Jin Ten Chi Sho, that was shot all to hell. You know it's funny how one little glance in the wrong direction can fuck up all your hard work for a normal life. In my case, it was actually my best friend's glance in the wrong direction, which led her straight to the book: The Universe of the Four Gods, a. k. a. the Shi Jin Ten Chi Sho. The first time that idiot Yuuki Miaka decides to read she picks the Shi Jin Ten Chi Sho, of all things! I don't know if I should kill her or kiss her for it. Get you mind out of the gutter! I didn't mean it that way! I'm definitely straight. Believe me.  
  
I should hate Miaka because that book made my world do a complete 180. It drug me, kicking and screaming, from my little protective bubble. You know what I'm talking about. That little bubble that you build around yourself, thinking nothing can hurt you, and that there are no monsters in the closet, or that   
those bed bugs your parents warn you about aren't real. Well, Dearheart, bring out your Monster-Be-Gone and your Raid, 'cause they're real. And not all monsters you can spot right away, because not all of them are ugly. Trust me on this one. I've met a monster more beautiful than anyone I've ever met before, but he was a monster just the same.   
  
Anyway, the book. Yes I should hate my best friend for finding the book. And for I while I did hate her. So much that I wanted to kill her. "Why?" you ask? Because as I read the pages out loud to her we were both sucked into the damn thing. I swear to the gods that I'm not lying. And I'm not crazy. It's kinda surprising though, I mean, after all that we've been through both Miaka and I are as sane as a person can get. But back to the story. By some twist of fate and my oh so wonderful talent for misreading emotions, we both ended up as priestesses for two different warring gods. Miaka as Suzaku no Miko, and I as Seiryuu no Miko. To tell you the truth that wasn't exactly the most glamorous moment of my life. Though all of Miaka's shichiseishi (Celestial Warriors) loved her with the utmost devotion and would walk through fire for her, my seishi wouldn't have cared if I were devoured or not. Well, okay, not all. Suboshi would have done everything in his power to get me back, or probably would have killed himself to follow me into the after world. I wonder why I never let myself love him then. I think for the most part I was afraid. Afraid that   
he'd end doing the same thing as the perverts in the ally did, or eventually leave me for someone else. But I think I was mostly scared to death that after I summoned Seiryuu, I'd have to leave him behind. Boy, I don't think I could have ever been more wrong about anything in all my life.  
  
Which brings me to the good things that came out of the Shi Jin Ten Chi Sho. It gave Miaka her Tamahome. After all was over and done with, I did get jealous of them. It made my blood boil. Miaka lost the love of her life, but waited what? Maybe a month or two before Tamahome was reincarnated into our world as Taka. While I had lost Suboshi, the only man who had ever loved me, not Seiryuu no Miko, not the girl that fell out of the sky, but Hongo Yui. Now before you get your panties in a wad, I'll let you know that I tried to love Tetsuya. Lord knows, I really did. For two and a half years I tried. But I could never find   
that spark. You know, that spark makes you want to give every bit of you heart and soul out to a person. The sunglasses didn't help any. He wouldn't take them off, even for me. As stupid as it sounds, I was beginning to wonder if the guy had eyes at all, I mean, why else would they be that important?  
  
So, six months before being together for three years, I broke up with Tetsuya. He told me he had seen it coming for a long time. Sometimes I wonder why he held on so long. Unsolved mystery. But that's past, this is present.   
  
It wasn't but another six months after Tetsuya and I went our separate ways when I saw the last thing I ever expected to see. Working at a car repair shop, covered in oil and grease, was an eighteen year-old boy with mossy-blonde hair, blue eyes and a blue bandana tied firmly around his brow. What stuck out the most was that with his blue tank top on, you could see a kanji that seemed to be carved into his left shoulder. Kaku. It looked as if someone had just went to his skin with a knife and carved the kanji there like they would on a tree trunk. Eiko Shinji was his name, but that didn't fool me for a second. I knew I had found my Suboshi after those three long years. Let's just say it finally put the last broken piece of my life back together.  
  
Like Taka, he had a completely new name, but unlike him, he still had all his memories. Like his name, his personality had changed a lot. He wasn't quite as brash, and not near as childish. I suppose all that time on his own did him some good. Though he still loved me more than ever, he wasn't so dependant. To put it   
shortly, he matured far more than anybody could ever imagine.   
  
At times I wish that his reincarnation was as simply explained as his personality change. I mean, Taka is the once in a life time miracle, right? Even HIS reincarnation wasn't supposed to happen. Like before, unsolved mystery. But, like I said, only at times do I ponder over it, most of the time I don't even bother myself with the question. Shinji is just one of those little things that you'd rather just go on not knowing, but enjoying it. But I'm sure you don't want to hear too much about all that mush, now do you? So here's a quick fast forward. Both Miaka and I graduated from High School and are nineteen now. I guess you could say we're all grown up now. Yep, rough tough big kids. College kids. By some God given miracle, Miaka made it to college. There's a breath taker for ya. I don't see why she even wanted to go. I just can't see her doing any job that requires a college education. I mean, come on, this is Miaka! So anyway, we're roomies in the Bataan College dorms. Taka and Shinji share a room one floor up from us. I guess it's a good thing we weren't scattered across the campus.  
  
So yeah, we were normal again. If you ignore the fact that our boyfriends both died at least once and have held about three different names, all was normal. Note the WAS. I swear, the second my useless life scrambles back together it gets tossed right back out to the wolves. This time I'd take Shinji, Miaka, and   
Taka down with me...  
~*~*~  
I woke up that fateful night twisted up in my sheets with a furry cat tail swishing under my nose.  
  
"Get lost, Ryuen" I grumbled, shoving the little body off the edge of my bed. As soon as he hit the floor he was back up on my bed again. Miaka can never figure out why it's only my bed that the cat sleeps on and why it's only my bed covered in cat sheddings. Truth be told, he knows better than to sleep with my room   
mate, unless he had a sudden suicidal urge to be squished. I've heard of dogs and things like that being suicidal and just waiting on the side of the road for the car that has their name on it, then just dart out in front of it. But no little furry friend would be crazy enough to sleep in the same bed as Miaka. Even I'm afraid to do that, too many old painful sleep over experiences from junior high.   
  
Oh, wait, I kinda owe you and explanation to this whole cat thing, don't I? Heh, yeah. See...for the past semester, we've been illegally harboring a cat in our dorm room. Shh, don't tell! As much as a pain that cat is, we love him! I think, as much as I deny it, I'd cry my little eyes out if he was ever taken away from us.   
  
I felt a paw gently trace a line down my cheek, then another just to make sure I got the message. That, there, my friends, is one of Ryuen's less violent ways of getting us - no, me. It'd take far more to get Miaka up. Something more along the lines of an earthquake that's jumping off the Richter scale. - outta bed. Hot dog! I'm in luck tonight! Ryuen wasn't possessed to do more just to get me up. I swear, his little mind can cook up some real evil methods to get what he wants, if he felt the urge. More luck for me, our dorm is on the ground floor so I can just slip out the window, let him do his business, then hop back in before getting caught.  
  
"Alright, alright. I'm up." I literally had to roll out of the bed, otherwise the warmth of the covers would have immediately drawn me back to the mattress the moment I tried to get up. Then the cat would have to   
resort to a much more painful way of getting my sleepy ass out of bed. "Come on." I staggered to my feet and snatched him up in my arms. He protested softly when I didn't make a very straight line to the window. He squalled even more when I had to shift him from his comfortable position in order to get the window   
open. With one hand I slid the window open then tucked it back against my body as I crawled through. I dropped him to the soft soil of the flower bed by our window before I was even half way through the window frame. I swung my legs around and both feet touched moist ground at the exact same time.  
  
"Holy shit!" I had to clamp my hand over my mouth before I woke someone up. "Gods, this sucks," I glared down at the mud caking around my bare feet. If only I had remembered that it had rained that afternoon...yuck. And as if the mud between my toes wasn't bad enough, a rather chilly gust of wind hit me in full force, dropping my body temperature a good 10-15 degrees. Wonderful, just peachy.   
  
Why me?  
  
Ryuen poked his head out from behind a bush and just gazed up at me blankly.  
  
"Well? What are you waiting for? Lets go." He protested, but scuttled out into the open obediently . In an attempt to make it up to me, Ryuen brushed against the backs of my legs, which did not help my serious case of the shivers by any means. Great, perfect. Probably had mud all over me now. I knelt down to scoop   
him back up in my arms when he bounded off the opposite direction. "And just where do you think your going?" I got up and staggered after him as he scuttled towards a clump of trees that marked the on-campus picnic area. Something at the pit of my stomach pleaded that I just let the idjit cat be and get some sleep. I   
pushed those marvelously tempting ideas away and struggled to keep up.  
  
Ryuen stopped, bawled at something in the darkness then retreated behind my ankles. Okay, now that was odd. He never does anything like that, he's a got a "big-tough-kitty" attitude, not "I'm-a-girly-kitty-save-me!!". I knelt back down to re-attempt the scooping of the cat, when I saw a flash of deep amber. And when I said flash, I meant flash. A rustle of leaves and a streak of gray marked the end of whatever had been there. Not good.  
  
I dunno, I guess a few clouds decided that, hey, they wanted to part from the moon, or something like that, but a sudden shaft of moonlight beat down through the gaps of the leaves belonging to each tall tree that hang over me. My breath caught in my throat at what it revealed. A crumpled figure laying stomach down   
in the mud. Underneath it and smeared across it's tender flesh was mud with a deep eerie red sheen to it. Oh dear god.  
  
Ryuen cried out again from behind me. What a weenie. I swear. Still crouched down, I scrambled over to the shadowy figure, my thin pale hand clinging to the bark of the near by tree as if it would save me from whatever the thing was. More clouds parted, I guess, because the moonlight intensified so that I could make out the...whatever it was. Gods, I still have nightmares about what I saw.  
  
I finally got close enough to the object in the dark to where I could make out important features by the moonlight. There plastered into the mud was a boy a year older than myself, still in school uniform, his cheek pressed against the ground so that his face was turned toward me. Glassy, cold, dead blue eyes gazed   
at me and the mouth was parted as to form unearthly words. There was a gaping hole shredded out of his neck, important veins, arteries and other vital throat organs lay strewed out, basking in the cool open night air. I rocked back on my heels, tears cascading down my cheeks. Aside from the blood and fatal injures, the gentleness of the face was all too familiar, tearing away at my heartstrings. "Takeru," I whimpered to the dead boy.  
  
Something else flashed in the moonlight, an eerie amber. Then came the sound of chains giving a gentle rattle. I found myself looking into two familiar globes of dull amber. From somewhere around the new large figure a gentle blue glow illuminated the darkness. Oh shit.  
  
"Ashitare?" The eyes flashed wide, followed by an excited grunt. After a great deal of thrashing about, he calmed and gave me an empty stare. "Ashitare? WHY?" Suddenly I exploded in fear, sadness, and utter rage. "Why, Ashitare? Why him? What in the hell did he do to you?" Not that I bothered to think about the fact that Ashitare shouldn't have been there in the first place. Noooo. Of course not.   
  
Stupid me.  
  
"Rot in Hell, Ashitare," I sobbed, bitter salty tears dripping over the edge of my chin. His empty stare narrowed in confusion at the command I had given him.  
  
"Yu-i..." He grunted softly then whimpered. Never had I heard him speak a single word, not one. So you could imagine how it sent me reeling when I heard that. Dear God, I still shiver when I recall his voice. With another grunt a blue glow engulfed his hunched figure, and like that he was gone. By now my eyes were stinging awfully with my hot angry tears.  
  
Ryuen wailed once more. I forgot about him! I scrambled as fast I could over to him and roughly took him up in my arms. Gods, it felt good to have something to hold onto, even if it was our little whimpy cat! He squirmed in my arms and scratched against my chest and stomach. Of course me being so drugged up on the adrenaline and pure fear that coursed through every tiny muscle in my body, didn't feel a thing.  
  
Ha! There was the window! I don't think I took the time to carefully squeeze through, more like I just lurched out at it and got lucky enough to get through with only one major scrape that covered half my back. Sheesh, there's real luck for ya. It felt like someone had peeled all the skin off my back like I was a banana. Warm blood was drenching my cotton shirt. I glanced around the room madly, trying to remember just where Miaka's bed was. When I get scared or hyped up like that I tend to forget things, even the smallest stupid things. What can I say? No one's perfect.  
  
Found her! Asleep. Great. Here I am, all bloody and ready to just keel over dead from fear and Miaka is out cold, mumbling something about how Taka shouldn't have eaten sushi. Wonderful.  
  
"MIAKA! Wake up!" In utter frustration I chunked Ryuen right in her face. Whoops! Poor kitty. But hey, it got her up! She sat straight up like a board and just looked at me with her big brown eyes, confused as normal. Hell, I couldn't blame her this time.  
  
"Oh. O-hayo gozaimasu, Yui-chan!" I don't know maybe it was my incredulous expression, or the fact that I had blood all over me. But she looked troubled and her eyebrows etched together in thought. "What's wrong, Yui-chan?!" I exhaled deeply, part of my stress flowing out with my breath. How could I just stay upset with the idiot? Especially, when she had been innocently sleeping away and me and my inconsiderate self had thrown the cat in her face.  
  
"Just stay in here. Clean Ryuen up, it was muddy outside." She nodded slowly. I guess she was a bit surprised. I'm pretty sure I looked like I was either ready to scream my lungs out at someone or cry myself dry, and other than the last reminisce of the first tears I cried for Takeru, I wasn't doing too much of either. She nodded slowly and crept off her mattress. 'And don't go outside, whatever you do." I tried to run out of the room, but my legs weren't working very well with my brain, and I'm sure my feet must have been scratched all to hell. After a second try with my disobedient lower half, I was out of the room and down the hall in mere seconds.  
  
It was odd, I don't think I would have acted this way in the book at all. Just an everyday thing there. But, God, this wasn't supposed to happen here! Not now! I couldn't care right now if it had been Takeru or some unknown person, though it being Takeru added to the hurt, it was the fact the I had just witness the   
aftermath of a brutal murder, committed by MY DEAD seishi!! I felt like crumpling against a wall and scream and cry all at once. I guess some old habits never die, eh?  
  
Now, where was a security guard?? The campus ALWAYS has two or three about at night, I should know, I've had to dodge them with Ryuen all year long! The minute I need one they all disappear! Just my frigging luck!  
  
I rounded a sharp corner and BAM! Right into a body more than three times my size. THUD! I landed squarely on my butt while the other just had to take a step back to secure their balance.  
  
"What the bloody hell?" I shook my head clear and looked up. Yes! Wonderful! At the moment I was so grateful that I had just nearly mowed over a security guard, I don't think I could have even tried to restrain my bright relieved smile. He wasn't smiling back. Uh oh, he must have been staring at all the mud and   
blood on me.  
  
"What in the bloody hell are you doing running around like that? Are you alright?" I got to my feet hastily and nervously ran a hand through my hair. Aw crap! I should have just left my hair out of this mess. I'd be taking one hell of a shower later. Man.  
  
"Well...," crap! Where are you supposed to start with something like this? 'Yeah mister I was out relieving my cat that I'm not supposed to have when I saw a dead Takeru and a big wolf man that I met in a book looming over him,'??? I don't think so. I tried again. Great, just perfect. This time all that came out were more tears. I wanted to stop, I'm sure I looked like an idiot, but the urge was just too strong.  
  
The man rolled his eyes slightly and drew in a breath. "Why don't you take a second? When your done, I'll be down the hall." He turned to leave me. Pish, there wasn't a chance in hell I'd let that happen. Not now.I latched onto his arm and held on with a death grip. If the man really wanted to go the other end of the hall, he'd be dragging me with him.   
  
He sighed and turned back around and watched me compose myself with a bit of a twitch, irritation, I'd be willing to guess. It's just my luck to find the most uncompassionate cop ever to walk the face of the Earth.   
  
"There's a dead body at the picnic area!" Oh there's a great start, right to the point. Sheesh. "I don't know what to do, it looks like he had been attacked by some animal. I was out there and I just found him lying there, already dead!" He sighed deeply and his facial expression stressed.  
  
"Look. Just go back to your dorm, and take a shower for God's sake. I want to tell you everything is going to be fine, but apparently, it won't be. All I can tell you is we'll take care of things. Now go on." He shooed me off and gratefully, I stumbled all the way back to our room.  
~*~*~  
I woke up on my stomach (it hurt too damn much to sleep on my back). Sunlight stretched through the blinds and made lines of shadows all over my body. I blindly felt for my alarm clock with my hand. Found it. Groggily I stared into the numbers, 10:14 a.m. Oh, right, only ten. Silly me. I slid my hand back under   
my pillow and got comfortable again. WHAT?? I writhed into an upright position and nearly yanked the clock's plug out of the wall when I grabbed it again.  
  
"Ten fourteen?! Miaka!!" I glanced over to her bed and found her curled up in the covers and wiping the sleep from her eyes. Apparently I had just woke her up.  
  
"Hai?"  
  
"It's ten fourteen! We have classes! You turned my alarm off!" She nodded sleepily, not looking a bit remorseful. "Miaka!" She closed her eyes and snuggled deeper into her covers.  
  
"Go back to sleep, Yui-chan." I stared at her wide eyed, not quite knowing just how to react. She opened one eye and noted that I was still staring at her rather dumbstruck. Miaka sighed and sat up in her bed, looking at me sadly. For the first time I noticed that her eyes were all red and puffy, like she had cried herself to sleep. This morning they found Takeru-" she didn't even finish the sentence. She couldn't. Couldn't blame her, I was acting that way myself last night. Then it hit me. No wonder she turned the alarm off! There'd probably be a few days where we wouldn't be attending classes. Grievance period. "They're   
pretty sure it wasn't suicide or a homicide. But they're still taking people in for questioning," Miaka added between sobs.  
  
"Fat lot of help that'll do. Nobody will know anything." I sat Indian style in the middle of my bed, staring blankly at the floor. "Miaka," I paused already feeling the tears taking that beaten path down my cheeks. "Takeru wasn't just killed, he was torn apart. There was a HOLE in his neck!" I couldn't look up at her, knew her horrified expression already. I've seen it lots of times. "I saw Ashitare last night. He killed Takeru."  
  
You grew up way too fast  
And now there's nothing to believe  
And reruns all become our history  
A tired song keeps playing on a tired radio  
And I wont tell no one your name ~ Name, The Goo Goo Dolls  



	3. Tolls of Blood

Tolls of Blood  
  
Tell me, did the wind sweep you off your feet?  
Did you finally get a chance to dance along the light of day?  
And head back toward the Milky Way?  
Tell me, did you sail across the sun?  
Did you make it to the Milky Way to see the lights all faded?  
And that heaven is overrated?  
  
Sick bastard.  
  
Lost of people have called me that. I don't blame them, I'm not proud of what I did, but I don't regret it. Not a single bit. What's the point of wasting your time regretting something you can't change? Besides, they'd never understand. They had people who actually cared if they lived through the day, nobody cared   
about Aniki and I. No one! Amiboshi, my aniki, was my mother, my father, my brother, and my best friend. He was my twin. We were two sides of the same coin. He was Yin and I was Yang. We even shared the same face. They couldn't possibly understand what I lost when I lost Aniki!  
  
Never!  
  
It hurt so damn bad. I was grasping at straws, for a course of action, anything! Unfortunately for Tamahome, I grabbed hold of the one Nakago offered, which happened to be the simplest and most violent solution.   
  
And as sick and evil as it sounds, after all I had done, I hadn't exactly accomplished my objective. All I had done was gotten Tamahome pissed off at me. I had set out to wipe out his entire family, for he had shredded the last bit of mine all to hell. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. And I did it. I slaughtered those defenseless little kids. They didn't stand a chance. But he still had family. In Miaka, in the other Suzaku seishi. And even if I did have the Ryuuseisui, I wouldn't have stood a snowball's chance in hell against all   
of them.  
  
And I'm sure it really pissed him off when he found out that Amiboshi hadn't died at all. Just think, his father and four little siblings all died, for nothing.   
  
But that was then, this is now. I'm not Suboshi anymore. I'm Eiko Shinji. I've regained the innocence of Bu Shunkaku, and the blood Suboshi bathed his hands in has been cleaned away. Lord knows, Suboshi is still buried deep down in me, but he too has grown with me. He is as much apart of me as I am apart of him.  
  
We have been forgiven and accepted. Though Aniki is still in the Shi Jin Ten Chi Sho, I have all I'll ever need right here.  
~*~*~  
"Hey, Shinji" Cold hands shook me out of my dream. I shifted in my covers and rubbed my eye with the heel of my palm.  
  
"Muwaff-uh?" Okay, so maybe I wasn't completely awake. There's no way Yui could be trying to get me up at this ungodly hour. After a little bit of adjusting on my eyes' part, Yui's face dissolved away into Taka's. Ugh, now that's definitely something you don't want to see first thing in the morning. "What?" I grumbled then buried my face in my pillow, my dream starting to pick up where it left off.  
  
"Blah, blah, blah, Takeru, yack, yack, yack, no classes, blah, blah, blah." That's about all I caught. Quite frankly I didn't care to catch more. I was needed in my nice little dream. But of course I needed to say something to shut the bozo up. Lets see, he said something about Takeru, but that wouldn't be a good subject considering that for some odd reason Taka carried an intense dislike for my best friend. So, that leaves me with 'no classes', it'll do.   
  
"Er...fine. Um...then turn the alarm off, won't ya?" Not that I bothered to worry about why it was so urgent that he needed to tell me about it at insane hours of the morning. Of course not. And not that I bothered to notice that he actually called me by my name, and not Yo-yo Boy. Hell no.  
  
"Are you sure you're gonna be alright?" Damn, he's persistent. I shifted again and mumbled through my pillow.  
  
"Sure thing. 'Night, Little Ghost." And then I was gone. Fully knocked out till morning.   
~*~*~  
"What?!" Taka and I screamed in unison. I looked helplessly at Yui's face, praying that what she said couldn't have been true. Just received a double whammy. Takeru was gone and the Shi Jin Ten Chi Sho was acting up again. What ever happened to, "And they lived happily ever after"?!?! I thought we were   
through with the book!  
  
"No! Takeru can't be dead! It's not supposed to be happing again! Not again! He has to be alive! He has to be!" I was back in the book, on that cold tile floor, crying to myself. Shaking, shivering, quaking with the intense sobs. Another death.  
  
"I told you about it last night! Weren't you listening to me?!" Damn him, disturbing my wallowing in self-pity like that!  
  
"Of course not! Did it look that way?!" I fired back, tears stinging fiercely at my eyes. Miaka gave him a sharp jab in the ribs, I should remember to thank her for that.  
  
"Shin-kun?" I heard Yui's worried voice next to me. Since when did she get there? I thought she was standing across the room next to Miaka. "Don't shout. It's alright." Like hell it was! Takeru was gone! How in hell was it gonna be alright? She wrapped her arms around me and nuzzled against my shoulder. "Think   
about Kyoko. She lost a lot more than you did, Shin-kun." Damn, now I felt worse. Here I was, loathing everything under the sun, except Yui of course, when Kyoko had lost a lot more than I had. She had lost the love of her life. Murdered for no given reason. Last night she went to sleep, knowing her boyfriend loved her and that she loved him, then when she wakes up, poof, he's gone. Never to come back. Now there's an experience that can really damage someone's life. Poor girl.  
  
"I hope she'll be okay." There went Miaka with a wonderful little bout of utter stupidity. I know she was just being concerned, but that's gotta be one of the dumbest things I had ever heard pass her lips. If I was this tore up about it, think how bad Kyoko was suffering. Of course she wasn't going to be okay!  
  
Suddenly, from behind our closed door came a muffled knock. I cringed inwardly, praying which ever god heard me first that is wasn't who I knew it was. I begged that it be Kyoko, or maybe one of Taka's friends just don't let it be...Her. Miaka opened the door and in came one of the most evil beings I ever had the   
pleasure to meet.  
  
"Konnichi-wa, Yuuki-san, Sukunami-kun. Ah, and there's Hongo-san and Eiko-kun. Go-kigen ikaga desu ka?" The Guidance Counselor.  
~*~*~  
"I'm sure most of you know why you're here." Six of us were crowed into one little room, the Guidance Counselor's office. Yui, Miaka, Kyoko and I were all gathered onto a rather small couch. From left to right we went, Miaka, Kyoko, then Yui and I. Taka was content to sit in Tanaka-sensei's desk chair, rolling   
himself and the chair back and forth nonchalantly. I don't know WHY, but the chairs on wheels have always fascinated him. I must admit, they can be amusing, but I swear, that boy goes a bit overboard at times. And in addition to our solemn gathering was another person Takeru was associated with. Kunio Hirosu. I wouldn't call them "friends", but every now and then they'd hang out.  
  
The woman passed her sad gaze over each of our faces, waiting patiently for an answer. Hirosu, our wonderful crusader, volunteered one for her.  
  
"Yeah, Takeru was ripped to shreds and now you think we're gonna commit suicide over the loss of our dear friend," he sneered. Yep. Thank the gods for Hirosu. SUCH a way with words, I tell ya. Every inhabitant of the room, with the exception of Kyoko who looked like she was ready to break down into tears(by the look on her face it certainly wouldn't have been for the first time that morning) and Miaka who was trying to comfort her, shot him a death glare.  
  
Tanaka-sensei sputtered to find the words she was supposed to say and struggled to keep them in a semi-delicate tone. That is a very difficult task when it comes to Hirosu. "Now, Kunio-kun, that's not wh-"  
  
"But that's what you were thinking." He snapped. "You think we're loonies now that we've lost Takeru." She sputtered some more, and the glares being shot at the little prick intensified.  
  
"Gee, I wonder why?" I glanced at Yui, whom was too busy giving Hirosu her, "Stare of Doom," as I like to call it, to notice my rather wide eyes.   
  
"Bite me, psycho bitch," he growled, to which he promptly followed up with the one fingered salute. Now that was it! He was a dead man!  
  
"Hey!" Miaka squeaked.  
  
"You better shut the hell up you little prick!" I was on my feet before I knew it, that boy just accomplished one of the two things that really piss me off. One is insulting or causing bodily harm to my Aniki. The other would be doing aforementioned to Yui. I swear, if there hadn't been so many witnesses, I would have gladly ripped that finger right off for him!  
  
"Kunio-kun! Eiko-kun! Please refrain from such vulgar language!" Tanaka-sensei took a step toward Hirosu, but was taken aback by the look he threw at her.  
  
"Let him go, Yo-yo Boy, he's not worth it." Fat chance I'd listen to Taka, Hirosu had just insulted MY Yui! I felt a sudden tug on my arm, and I plopped back down on the couch. I glanced at Yui, whom after yanking me down was giving me a look that said the same as Taka had verbally. Now that inspired me to   
stay put and let him have his way.  
  
"You don't have a lot of room to talk, Sukunami. You date the klutzy, ditzy, bottomless pit." Oh shit, he just pinched a nerve deep in Taka. Seiryuu, help that poor soul. I can't watch!  
  
"Alright, that's it. Let's take him, Yo-yo Boy!"  
  
"Hell yeah!" Both of us were back on our feet and ready to take down the prick. Tanaka-sensei's eyes bulged and she threw her arms out and waved them about like it'd actually help the situation any.   
  
"No! Stop! We'll have no fighting, and no cursing in my office! Do you hear me??"  
  
"Shin-kun!" I felt Yui tugging at my arm again. As much as I love her, there wasn't a way in hell I'd sit back down! I was ready to skin the guy alive!  
  
By now everything was a whirl. All I really knew was that Yui still had a pretty hold on me, Hirosu hadn't moved at all, and Kyoko was crying. I didn't like that one tiny bit, I normally wouldn't. I like to be in control of the things happening around me and to be aware of things. This certainly didn't fall into that category.  
  
"I said SIT DOWN!" Tanaka-sensei's flushed face was right in Taka's, promptly inspiring him to do as he was told. I followed suit, my eyes probably as big as plates, if not bigger. I nailed my gaze to a wonderful bit of floor by my feet, maybe if I stared hard enough I could burn right through it. Hey! Then I could   
escape this torture chamber! But wait, no, that means I be doing a great deal of digging. Nevermind. Scratch that idea.  
  
"And YOU," she puffed, now literally nose to nose with Hirosu, "Have you no compassion? Ishino-san has just lost a very important person in her life. Can't you be decent? For her sake?" Hirosu didn't respond to Tanaka-sensei's rant and went into a deeper slump against the plastered wall. My, my, I've never seen   
Tanaka-sensei act quite like this. I must applaud Hirosu, he had just achieved something that many have strive to...getting the Counselor pissed. Till now it was unheard of! She's normally so happy-go-lucky it's sickening.  
  
"Now," the woman was still breathless, and it was kinda funny. If the conditions of the situation were different, I would have laughed. "Today's session wasn't exactly perfect." Nani?! What did she mean "today's" session???  
  
"Nani? You mean there's gonna be more??" I had gotten up again, but Yui fiercely tugged me back down to the couch cushion before Tanaka-sensei had the chance to jump on me like she had Taka and Hirosu. Where would I be without Yui? "It's pretty obvious that we're not suicidal."  
  
"No, just homicidal. That's all," murmured Taka under his breath. He shot Hirosu a nasty look that almost made the him squirm a bit. Ha HA! Just to see him uncomfortable made me feel better. I wonder how Takeru could have ever tolerated such a person blows my mind.  
  
Ignoring Taka, she continued, "Yes, I'll be seeing you bright and early tomorrow." Everybody groaned reluctantly. Well, almost everybody. Kyoko mostly made a little sniffling noise then something that sounded a little bit like soft whine.  
  
"Great, another love fest." I grumbled, slouching against Yui, suddenly, for the first time that morning, not quite feeling enough strength to get up from my seat.  
  
Tell me, did you fall for a shooting star?  
One without a permanent scar?  
And did you miss me while you were looking for yourself out there? ~ Drops of Jupiter, Train  
  



	4. Broken

Broken  
  
When I woke up this morning  
Wipe the sleep from my eyes  
I found a new day dawning  
And suddenly I realized... you're gone  
  
His hair was red.  
  
Never seen such red hair in all my life. Actually it was a nice little orangish red, the color of lively flames. Yes, I suppose that's the best description for it. Fiery. It looked wonderful on him, that fiery red hair that matched those cool blue eyes and that rambunctious personality. It all fit together so perfectly, such a wonderful mask. Yes, it hid things so well. No one could ever have guessed that he had never got to experience that nice, sweet, innocent, little childhood that most are blessed with.  
  
I envy him. I really do. I wish I could steal his mask away and use it for myself. He doesn't need it anymore. That's why I do.  
  
I used to lead a very sheltered life. My closest brush with death was when my goldfish died, and that's not very close. I don't remember being all that sad, but a goldfish is rather different from what Takeru was.  
  
That morning I had gotten the news. I still felt a bit numb. It's kinda hard to believe, you know. How could he be gone? A part of me was telling me to quit my crying because he wasn't dead. It's wasn't telling me that he still lived in my heart and soul, or anything like that. No, none of that cheesy crap that the movies love cram down it's viewers throats. Something more along the lines of, he was still alive and kicking, but I just couldn't seem to reach far enough out to touch him yet. Yet. Key word here. I couldn't explain why, partly because I didn't know myself, but somehow I did know that he was waiting for me in that   
untouchable place.   
  
It was nice to think that he was.  
~*~*~  
I eased the door shut behind me and slumped against it so deeply that I slid all the way down to the floor. Which was fine with me, I needed to curl up. Pull my legs against my chest, wrap my arms around myself and just bury my face in my knees. Ahh, the simple comforts.  
  
'Get yourself together! Look at you! You're a mess!'  
  
"I don't care!" I whispered to myself, hopefully shutting up that cold little voice. Yep there went my "strong side", it always yelled at me whenever I cried, or got overly sappy. And I normally listen, because crying isn't my thing, never really was, but this time I decided to ignore it. "I'm allowed to mope over   
Takeru!" I growled at the cold voice. And I would have showed that dumb voice! I would have showed it how much of a mess I could be! Would have, if I had any tears left to cry for it, that is. I wanted to cry buckets for that cold, stupid, little voice that forbade me to mourn for my Takeru! In fact, my delightful "strong side" reminded me more of Kunio Hirosu than I cared to be reminded of. And as far as I was concerned, Hirosu could just take a stroll off the edge of a conveniently high cliff, and he could take my "strong side" with him. Me, bitter? Of course not.  
  
Okay, so maybe just sitting there arguing with myself about crying wasn't the grandest thing I could have done, but I needed something. Something to make me feel better. Anything. Even if it was having a gripe session with the Hirosu version of myself.  
  
"Food. Food always cures depression," I murmured as I slowly climbed to my feet. Let me be fat forever if it'll cure this awful hurt! I crossed the room and into the kitchen. Just then my stomach roared so viciously that a tiger would have run and hid. So maybe I was a bit on the hungry side, nothing a nice cheap hot   
pocket couldn't cure. Boy, I lived off those things. I yanked the door opened and dug the cardboard box out from under the mound of empty frozen waffle boxes and old butter tubs filled with some of my room mate's uneatable concoctions. Hold it! It felt a bit light. I shook the box furiously, but all I heard was the   
small clamor of crumbs.  
  
"Ugh, Naoko!" She'd definitely be hearing from me! Eating the last hot pocket like that! May the wrath of my stomach be upon her!! I opened up the door again and flung the box back in then slammed the door. I knew she wasn't here, of course not. I'd just get her when she's sneaking back in. Ho boy, and would I ever get her.  
  
Great, so now I had nothing to binge off of.   
  
I hauled our trash can out from under the sink and over to the refrigerator/freezer, stifling the urge to give it a few swift kicks. Not only did I not get to settle my raging stomach, but I also turned out to be the unlucky soul to clean out the fridge. The second I yanked the freezer door open a whole mess of empty hot pocket and waffle boxes went tumbling out at my feet. We literally lived off of cheap freezer burnt hot pockets and waffles, and a rather large undignified heap of empty frozen cardboard boxes was all we had to show for it. We've tried cooking, it didn't work out all that well, the untouched butter tubs are proof of that. Ahh, the joys of being a poor college student. I get all misty eyed when I just think about.  
  
So there I spent the next ten minutes of my life, digging out every single cardboard box that had somehow managed to nudge it's way into what ever room had been left amongst the other amazingly empty boxes. I followed that amazing task up with a well deserved crash landing straight onto my bed.   
  
My hand hang over the side of my bed and I started to dig around in my book bag till my hand came across the rough surface of a book much smaller than my text books. I pulled it free from my bag and propped myself up on my elbows as I flipped open to the page I had marked, passing up the page my roommate had   
marked for herself. We had been reading this book for a while, but for some reason neither of us can't quite remember where we got it. We don't know the name of it, the cover is tattered beyond recognition. The book itself is pretty good, but I think we have reached the end of the story.  
  
I read aloud to no one.   
  
"And so with the power of his god sealed away, Seiryuu seishi, Nakago, was defeated by Tamahome."   
~*~*~  
Slowly I walked down the hall leading to their dorm. Or more accurately, I barely dragged my feet along and somehow ended up in front of their door. It was cracked open and I could see four of them talking amongst themselves.  
  
"What do you mean you've never heard Ashitare speak? He could talk. And the way you describe the whole thing is just strange, you made it sound like he was loyal to you. You know good an well that Nakago was his 'master'." That had to have been Shinji, sounded like him. But what in the world were they talking about? They had to have been talking about the characters in our book, but they made it sound like they had been there, in the story, which was the most ridiculous thing I'd ever heard of! They couldn't be. My imagination had to have been running wild again.  
  
I clunked my knuckles fairly hard against the wood frame of their door a couple of times then waited. The door swung inward and Miaka welcomed me into the room with a warm smile. The last bit of their conversation died away as I slipped into their room. I was half tempted to make them explain exactly what they had been talking about to me and ease my ever irritating curiosity.  
  
"Hey, Ryuen," I chirped when I saw that bundle of fur bounding towards me. I took him up in my arms andbegan to gently scratch behind his ear. "Hi, guys." They responded with a few "Hi's", "Hey's" and one wave from Taka, I guess it was kinda awkward. Shinji looked up at me, his unruly bangs hanging like a crude curtain in front of his eyes. He looked different somehow. Oh that's right, just like everybody else, he hadn't taken the care to dress exceptionally well like normal. Just simple jeans and a tank top, nothing special. Wait, what was that? On his shoulder, a symbol. No. No, a kanji. Suboshi. What in the world?!  
  
"Hey, Kyoko, what's the matter?"  
  
"Um, I've really got to go," I piped. "Guess I'll see you tomorrow!" I waved quickly and scrambled out into the hall, away from the strange looks they probably had painted across their faces. Man, now I felt stupid. I pressed my back against their closed door and nearly curled back up into a little ball again, but I stopped myself. Let's face it, the hall isn't exactly the grandest place to just ball up. I mentally slapped myself and started back towards my dorm that was just down the hall, I just had to pull myself back together! Never before have I acted so scatterbrained, I swear!  
  
"Hey, Kyoko?" Huh? What now? I turned around and found the owner of the voice that had called me.  
  
"Yui? Why'd you follow me out?" She smiled softly and turned her head to face her dorm.  
  
"Everybody's worried about you. I mean, you acted a bit weird in there." Try more than a "bit" weird. Stupid me, first I was caught staring and acted extremely jumpy - or paranoid, which ever floats your boat - and now I had to explain it Yui. How do I get myself into things like this? I think I flushed all my "calm" down the toilet that morning. It'd sure come in handy right about now. "Are you sure you're alright? If it's about Takeru, you really shouldn't bottle it up, you know."  
  
"I know. I'm alright, I think I'm still just a little shook up about things. That's all." She kept smiling and nodded while I prayed that she bought it. If you haven't noticed, I had wanted to get away from them for the time being. So, I left. I wish I hadn't, now. I wish I had nudged all that stuff about the book out of them. But of course, I spazed out at the first bit of weirdness that I could have just as well been imagining anyway, and took off. I didn't look back either, just trudged back to my dorm, dragging my fingertips along the wall as I walked.   
~*~*~  
"Hey Kyo-chan, where ya been?" I pulled myself out of my wonderful mental dilemma when I heard Naoko's voice from our room. I leaned towards the open door way to find her grinning at me like she normally did. I swear, the girl doesn't quit smiling for anything, she'll be buried with a grin on her face.  
  
"I was out."   
  
I heard a giggle from the other room, then a nice surprised, "Ooo!" Good grief. "Kyo-chan, come here!" I braced myself - with her it could be anything - and shuffled into our bed room. She sat Indian style in the middle of the floor with pictures scattered all around her, some in nice neat little stacks and some in messy piles. "What do you think about this picture?" I didn't brace myself well enough. It was of all of us laying out on the college steps. Miaka so attached to Taka he was turning blue from thee lack of air, Shinji and Yui holding each other all sweetly, and Takeru and I looking completely and totally insane.  
  
"Where'd you find this?"  
  
"It was in with the rest of my picture stash. Now come with me, you need your daily nourishment before digging into the rest of my stash." She hopped up and tugged me into the kitchen. I must find out how she managed to "hop" from Indian style to her feet in one swift move, because from previous personal experiences I've learned that it doesn't work very well for us normal people. "Ta-da!" She flung open both refrigerator and freezer doors and I think my jaw hit the tile floor. "Beautiful, isn't it?" We had just about every form of food under the sun, and I'm not talking about all the stale frozen junk. It was the good stuff!!  
  
"When? How?! Who did you pickpocket?!"  
  
"No one! Can you believe it?! Oh yeah, uh remember that picture I took of that one guy looking all dramatic and such?" I nodded, how could I forget? It was a breathtaking shot, one of her best pictures. "Yeah well, the art world finally recognized my talent and gave me all this money for that one picture." I think I could have hugged the life right out of her right then.  
  
*And so, we ate ourselves into oblivion. We caught up on that important gossip, had a nice gripe session, talked about Takeru and then cried our little eyes out for him. I'm sure that part steamed my "strong side", especially after we both had thought I had already cried myself dry. Apparently both me's were proved   
wrong.*  
  
"How weird! He really had Suboshi's kanji?" Naoko looked ecstatic, like her wildest dream had come true. The idiot. The younger of the Bu twins had been one of her favorite characters. I personally lean more towards the monk, Chichiri, or as Naoko likes to call him, "The One Eyed Wonder". Mean, isn't she?  
  
"Yeah, he even kinda looks like him. Or at least as much as I can tell from that little ink sketch. And if you think about it, he even acts a little like him." What was I doing?! This was dumb! There was no possible way they could have any part of that story! Right? "It's gotta be a coincidence, you know?"  
  
"Yeah, I guess. But wouldn't it be awesome if it really was him?"  
  
"But it's not, we've finished the book. He's dead. Remember?" That right there earned me the nastiest look that I think she could muster up. It wasn't too bad, she didn't have much practice in sour faces. That's what she got for being insanely upbeat all the time! So, ha!  
  
"Think you'll be able to handle tomorrow?" Gee, thanks Naoko for bringing that up. I had been trying to forget about it. It certainly wasn't an event I had been looking forward to.  
  
"Not really."  
~*~*~  
The dreams I had that night officially rank as the most terrifying and disturbing I've ever had. And if just one nightmare wasn't bad enough, nnooooo...I had a whole series of them, one right after another. Most started out with Takeru goofing around like normal, trying to get anyone and everyone to laugh. One minute I'd be teasing him and telling him if he made that face any longer it'd stick, then it'd come out of the clear blue. And after the first few runs of a few variations of this dream, I figured out his fate wasn't going to change and I'd try to scream out to him, but was always too late. He'd literally get ripped apart right in front of my eyes. Then I'd wake up and cry till there was no more to cry. I'd unwillingly fall back asleep and the horrible cycle would start all over again.  
  
Not my greatest night's sleep.  
  
That morning my roommate had to haul me out of my bed, which was a difficult task considering once I got wind of what she was going to do I latched onto the mattress with every bit of my failing morning strength. Stupid failing morning strength, if I had just been awake for just a few more minutes I'd have had   
my full strength and I could definitely out-power her. But that did a lot of good for me, because I here I was in front of Tanaka-sensei's office with Naoko. I don't know why I wanted to stay in bed, after all, the dreams would come back, but I was so tired. Dang, stupid dreams was really throwing a royal wrench in   
my system. It was amazing I was able to stand on my own.  
  
"I'll be out here, okay? Now get in there!" Easy for her to say, she'd be outside the door, safe and sound from the insanity. Some support she was.  
  
"Yeah right," I grumbled before slipping into the already crowed room. I shuffled over to the spot I had occupied the day before, dropped my backpack to the floor and sat down. Everyone was as they had been during our previous meeting, but this time there was hardly a person that was fully awake and functioning. Everyone, that is, with the exception of Hirosu who was glaring straight ahead, eyes narrowed and a look that could kill. My, he's such a happy camper in the morning...or at any other time of the day, for that matter. Taka didn't look too entirely thrilled either. Come to think of it, no one did.  
  
"Why'd you bring your backpack?" I had left the zipper half-way zipped and Miaka was inspecting the innards with much curiosity. Curiosity killed the Miaka.  
  
"Because I need to return a book to the library." It was partly true, I was going to stop by the library and see if it was their book. Like I said, we have no clue where we got it from.  
  
"Hey! That looks like the book!" She lunged right across my lap and snatched the book out of my bag. By the time she was back in her own seat I was edging closer to the arm of the couch than I already was to put even the tiniest bit of distance between us. I glanced over at Taka, whose reaction was a lot like mine. He was superdeformed and wide eyed. "Hey it's different! What happened to us?!" Yui snapped her head around, just then getting into the swing of the conversation. I snatched the book away from Miaka and skimmed through the page she had been looking at.   
  
Sure enough. It was different, alright.  
  
I began to reread the first page, and found it pretty much the same, just a few word changes here and there. Amazingly, I diligently dodged a hand that shot out to take the book out of my hands just as I finished off the page. I glanced around at everyone, Tanaka-sensei was just coming over to join us, Taka was getting up from his seat with a nervous look on his face, Hirosu hadn't moved, Miaka was wide eyed and kept shifting her gaze from me to Yui who was frantic about getting the book away from me. Shinji had just come to realize what was going on and was just turning his head to look at us.   
  
Cautiously I flipped the page. What in the world could be their problem?! Good grief, acting like the world as we know it was ending. Can we say "high strung"?  
  
Then, out of the clear blue, as I felt the book being ripped out of my hands, a gigantic light hit me in full force.  
  
It burned at my poor, unprepared eyes, and when I shut them to block it out, there was no blackness. Just the pink that was the back of my eyelids. I felt the pressure of bodies being squished against me for a split second, then it was gone. Everything my senses told me about my surroundings had vanished and I felt a cool rush of air, like I was falling. I pried my barely recovered eyes opened and watched the ground rush up to catch me. I felt my shoulder hit first and the rest of me skidded along for a good ways, then decided it'd be even better to let me tumble for another good long bit. I opened my mouth to scream and was rewarded nicely with a ever-so-tasty mouthful of dirt. It had to have been an incline that I had landed on, because there's no way on God's good earth that I could have gone this far on a flat surface. I thrashed as I tumbled, trying to find anyway to stop when...  
  
BAM!  
  
I'm in state of confusion  
I hope things aren't what they seem  
If this is really happening  
Just let me go back to dream...you're home ~ Tell Me I Was Dreaming, Travis Tritt  



	5. The One That Got Away

The One That Got Away  
  
You've got to leave me now  
You've got to go alone  
You've got to chase a dream  
One that's all your own before it slips away  
When you're flying high  
Take my heart along  
I'll be the harmony  
To every lonely song that you'll learn to play  
  
I knew she didn't want to go, and really instead of enforcing her presence, I wanted to say, "Screw 'em, you're staying with me, there's nothing wrong with you!" But you couldn't tell that by the way I had mercilessly hoisted her out of her bed earlier that morning.  
  
She wasn't needed there, she had a better chance of getting over Takeru on her own. Having Kunio Hirosu getting into a fight with every breathing organism in the vicinity wasn't exactly the greatest way of doing the job. In fact, Kyo-chan was most likely to come out crying again than feeling better about the whole thing.  
  
A way I figured it had really got to her was the fact that that morning she grumbled a few words I didn't even know she knew, about everything under the sun. I believe that has been the first time I had EVER heard her curse, and I've known her since elementary. So, yeah, that right there just kinda gives that away.  
  
"I'll be out here, okay? Now get in there!" I had said, giving her a gently nudge of encouragement.  
  
"Yeah right." I giggled at her as she trudged into what she had made out to be hell on Earth. Feeling a bit tired myself, I slumped lightly against the door and looked at the floor as I listened to what had to have been Miaka's high pitched voice. I was on the verge of curling up in a ball and going back to sleep right there - my mind had been seriously debating it for some time - when I heard a few various startled screams. Through semi-blurry vision I watched a gentle, purple, velvet-like light crawl out from under the door then fall away like it had never been.  
  
"Kyo-chan!" I nearly tore the door off it's hinges and nearly busted my nose with it. The Klutz Syndrome strikes again!   
  
The room was completely empty of life, all the furniture was a it had been, but everyone was missing, including Kyoko and her bag. No, wait, a book was opened in the middle of the floor.  
  
Not just any book! It was our book!  
  
I rushed over to it and dropped to my knees in order to see the black and white print. There on the first page was a picture of seven people lying, knocked out, on the ground. Certainly wasn't there last time I had checked. I gathered the book up in my arms and made a mad dash for Yui and Miaka's room. Somehow as incredibly off the wall as it sounds, I believed that they were apart of the book now. When Kyo-chan had first told me about Shinji and the others, as much as she didn't want to believe that they could have been apart of it, I did. I don't know why, but I had wanted to believe it, totally and completely.  
  
Anyways, I went to their room because if they really were gone, Ryuen, their kitty, couldn't just stay there alone, and quite frankly I don't think I could have just stayed by myself.   
  
I settled into a chair and flipped open to the first page and began to read.  
  
I'll keep looking up  
Awaiting your return  
And my greatest fear will be that you will crash and burn  
And I won't feel your fire  
Or be the other hand  
That always holds the line  
Connecting in between your sweet heart and mine  
I'm strung out on that wire ~ When You Come Back Down, Nickel Creek  
  



	6. Fire and Water

Fire and Water  
  
It's funny how life turns out  
The odds of faith in the face of doubt  
Camera One closes in,  
The soundtrack starts,  
The scene begins...  
  
It had been just another innocent morning. And if you ignore the fact that I felt dead to the world -probably looked it too- and was being forced into another dreaded counselor meeting from hell, you could say it was going beautifully. And everything would have went smashingly if dear Miaka hadn't gotten overly nosey and hadn't went rummaging through Kyoko's bag to find It.  
  
Everything I worked my butt off for, tossed out the window in yet again one single glance in the wrong direction.  
  
For some reason I don't feel a good day coming on....  
  
I just KNEW I should have stayed in bed!!  
~*~*~  
"Yui? Hey, rise and shine." I'd rise but I sure wouldn't shine. Ugh, who was that? I wished they'd go away, I felt like hell. "You okay?" How about a nice firm "no".  
  
It had to have been Taka. Sounded like him anyway.  
  
I pried my eyes open and made a valiant attempt to give him the glare of the century, but my eyes refused to adjust properly, so I simply slid them closed in defeat.  
  
"Does it look it?" I grumbled, sounding a lot like a grumpy five year-old in desperate need of a nap. He laughed as he pulled me to my feet, not a smart move. Sure, he yanked me up, but I wasn't functioning well enough to get a good enough footing and down I went, sprawling face down, to the ground. Ouch, pardon me while I regain my breath. I pulled my nose out of the dirt and squinted at him. My Death Glare feature was still out of order for the time being. "Taka?"  
  
"Yes?" He sweatdropped and hurriedly helped me up. This time he held on while I got my balance intact.  
  
"I think you've just sprained my pride."   
  
"It's about time you wake up." Who, what? Where was that voice coming from? Wait, that sounded like...  
  
"Taiitsukun!" Still clutching my shoulder, Taka jumped in surprise, his arm jolting me off balance again. Luckily I caught myself that time, this certainly wasn't going to be a good day for me.  
  
"Yui! You're okay!" I wasn't prepared in the least for the super sonic screech, and by the look on Taka's face, he wasn't either. I glanced behind me and saw both Miaka and Shinji walking towards us, each with a person slung over their backs, and trailing pretty close behind them was Tanaka-sensei. When they got close enough they both gently placed their unconscious person of choice on the ground and jogged over to join us.  
  
"Taiitsukun!" Miaka smiled joyfully at the master of the Shi Jin Ten Chi Sho.   
  
"Do you know who you just packed up here?" Taiitsukun had turned to Miaka, her old bulldog face slightly tugging upwards in a smirk.  
  
"Ishino Kyoko?"  
  
"Well, yes and no. That is her name, but here she'll be referred to as something rather different." Everyone rewarded Taiitsukun with a confused and slightly ignorant look. "Have you ever looked at the stars?" She waited for a few nods before continuing, "The sky is divided as well as this world, Genbu controls the North, Seiryuu with the East, Suzaku and the South, and Byakko's domain is the West. But if you look at the sky, in the center there is a handful of unnamed constellations waiting for their time. The Naka no Shichiseishi. They have no specific origin, they are scattered all over this world. But there is another out there, an evil force waiting for them to gather."  
  
"Well, gee, that's a shock." Miaka swatted the insolent Taka upside the head.  
  
Without another word said, Taiitsukun was gone, poof, just like that, much to Taka's relief. Miaka's eyebrows knotted together in confusion until she finally couldn't help herself anymore.  
  
"What does that have to do with Kyoko?"  
  
"Use your head Miaka, apparently she's their miko. Really, how hard is it to figure that out?" I half expected to hear Tanaka-sensei chiding me over being a little mean to her, but I was surprised when she didn't. That's when I realized that we were one person short of what we had been just minutes ago.  
  
"What in the world?!" Drat! I was hoping she had been sent back. Of all the rotten luck! Everyone turned to where Tanaka-sensei's startled voice had come from, not really wanting to find out what was so odd. "What's wrong with him?" I realized she hadn't listened to a single word Taiitsukun had to say and had instead wandered off to check on the unconscious duo. I sighed to myself as I made my way over to her. I should have been grateful she wasn't spazing out, after all, she could be doing worse. "What's wrong with Kunio-kun's face? My eyes lazily shifted to where she was pointing. There, right smack-dab in the middle of Hirosu's right cheek was a kanji beaming proudly like no tomorrow. "Water?"  
  
"Mizu," I confirmed solemnly, silently praying for the poor soul that'd have to explain it to him when he woke up. "He's a Naka seishi." The kanji gleamed brighter then flickered out. Poor Kyoko, not that most of my seishi were any better, mind you. I turned my head back to the majority of our group and yelled, "Hey, anybody know where we are?"  
  
"Looks like we're just outside of Konan!" Taka offered loudly. "We should probably head to the Eiyou!" A part of me growled at the thought of going to my former enemy's capitol, and I'm sure the feeling was pretty mutual for it's inhabitants. I never really left on good terms.  
  
"Tanaka-sensei? You wouldn't happen to have a glowing kanji on your body, would you?" She looked at me strangely, and I'm sure she would have asked if I had managed to get into some illegal drugs if earlier she hadn't watched herself get sucked into the pages of a story book. She'd probably checking herself for illegal substances later, thinking so smart ass kid slipped something in her coffee.  
  
"Not that I know of," she trailed off, looking back down at Kyoko and Hirosu. "Hongo-san? Just where are we and what exactly is going on here?" Oh boy, that'll be a fun story. I signaled for Shinji and Taka to come over to join us.  
  
"It's Yui, and it's a very long story. I promise, I'll explain everything when we get to Eiyou, but right now we have to worry about getting there."   
~*~*~  
By the time we reached Eiyou's streets everybody had already carried at least one of the two unconscious ones for part of the way, only my moment as a pack mule was cut short due to the fact that I had a rather large window-wound on my back from the night before last that was starting to re-open with the help of my human load. So now the back of my shirt looked like I tried that weird American Tie-dye crap on it with red dye, and Hirosu's front looked just as nice. I'm glad I got the idea to take his leather jacket off him, because I think he would have killed me with his bare hands if I had gotten it all bloody.  
  
"So, Ghost, what exactly IS your plan?" I turned my gaze to Shinji, who was slightly bent over with the weight of my former load on his back. My poor pack mule. His face was gleaming with sweat and his lips tugged to one side in a slightly domestic evil smirk. I love it when he does that! Gahh! What was I thinking? I'm supposed to be worrying over all these other things, can't be off daydreaming! But, he's got the LOOK on...arg! Shinji, be serious or something! I'm supposed to be thinking stuff out! Can't do it with you when you've got the Look on!  
  
"I'm hoping too much time hasn't passed here and Houki is still around. Besides, Miaka and I are Suzaku, after all. You don't watch it Yo-yo Boy and with a simple snap of my fingers I could have you and that miko of yours cleaning out horse stalls." Shinji's smile faded when Taka refused to give him any pleasure out of his snide remark. Much better. Only thing is, Taka now needed to be injured.   
  
Like she had read my mind, Miaka reached over and gave him a good smack on the back of the head. Now I was happy. Of course, now, Shinji looked over at me and gave me a tender smile. Sigh. Excuse me while I go melt into a little "Puddle 'O Yui", might as well just give up on doing any deep thinking for now.  
  
About the time I was seriously considering how much fun it could actually be to scare the living daylights out of the people who were giving us odd looks, I heard Miaka happily chime, "We're here!" And so we were. I craned my head back in hopes of seeing all the palace but those were dashed away as the sun peeking over the far walls blinded me angrily. "Wow, it hasn't changed a bit," she breathed with a grin on her face.  
  
"I wonder just how long it's been," Taka whispered to no one in particular, a smile creeping across his lips.   
  
"Miaka! Tama!" I glanced to my left just in timed to see an orange haired man hop off a palace wall and run towards the couple, arms outstretched.   
  
Tasuki. The swearing pyromaniac bandit. Miaka's 5th Suzaku Seishi.  
  
He was dressed rather nicely, or as nice as it gets when it comes to ancient China. He wore more regal looking clothes than usual, not anything a prince would wear, just something simple. Nice, but simple.  
  
He stopped dead in his tracks when he noticed Shinji and I. I don't think that the new people bothered him so much as us "Seiryuu's" did.   
  
"Excuse me, but did I just happen to miss something here? What the hell are they doing HERE?!" I could already picture Shinji lashing out at him for the comment, not pretty. I grabbed hold of his arm and shoulder before he could react, hopefully avoiding much bloodshed. Miaka gave her seishi a watery smile and began to explain everything to him.  
  
After many more good swears and ranting, we got everyone bandaged to the extend of need and got Kyoko and Hirosu into rooms so they could rest. I had a good mind to ask for one of my own, but of course Miaka insisted I stay and visit with Houki and her son, Boushin. I wish I would have just taken the nap.  
~*~*~  
A Few Hours Later  
~*~*~  
What the hell kinda bad day is this?! First I get sucked back into that damned book, then get thrown in the dirt by Taka, got mildly insulted by him, then received a full blown insult from Tasuki, got my shirt looking like crap, not to mention I was completely exhausted. And NOW I had to explain to a psychopath why he's in ancient China with a purple kanji that read "water" on his cheek! Why me?!  
  
I quietly and ever-so-carefully eased into Hirosu's room and found his leather jacketed figure sitting up on the side of the bed, back facing me. He snapped his head around in my direction and lemme tell ya, if looks could kill I would have been lying cold and dead on the floor. The glint in his cold metal gray eyes made it apparent that he was sincerely pissed, but did I take the hint? Of course not, not me.  
  
"Are you feeling okay? You had quite a bump." He turned back around and glared straight ahead. Stupidly hoping to get somewhere with my task, I crossed the room and sat next to him on the bed.  
  
"Cut the crap, Yui," he growled fiercely, refusing to face me. With one hand he began to fumble through an inside pocket of his jacket.  
  
"Well, excuse me for being concerned." I literally had to bit my tongue to keep the colorful language that threatened to spill out to myself. Oh how I wished I could have let him have it, just go all out and put the bugger in his place. Had it been anyone else they'd be cringing in fear and suggesting a few anger management programs to me. But it was Hirosu, and truthfully, he scares me too much. "I swear."  
  
I never saw it coming. I never saw him get up. Never saw him pull his hand and a shiny metal object out of his pocket. But he did it. And I found myself staring down the length of a cool metal gun barrel that was pressed firmly between my eyes.  
  
"Tell me what the fuck is going on, now." I tried my very best to look calm and unaffected all the while my insides had turned to utter mush.   
  
"Only if you take this gun out from between my eyes." I put my hand up against the length and tried to avert it's line of fire away from my forehead whilst trying to match his glare with one of my own.   
  
"No. Now, talk."   
  
"Not until you put the gun down."  
  
"Damn it!" He bit out a few more words that I'd care not to repeat and finally backed down, allowing my heart rate to drop down drastically. I noticed he never put the gun away, but, hey, he wasn't about to blow my brains out, either. That's a definite plus there. I drew in a deep breath, readying myself for the worst.  
  
"As totally insane, off the wall, and stupid as it sounds you have to believe me."  
  
"I don't have to believe a single thing you say," he said, slumping against the wall. What is with him and walls?! Why can't he sit like a normal person?!  
  
"Okay, fine, but please, just listen to me." I paused, waiting for a smart remark or a signal to keep going. He blinked, good enough. "There is an ancient Chinese book called the Shi Jin Ten Chi Sho, the book itself is a spell," I explained, shamelessly quoting a line from the first page that I had read out loud to Miaka four years ago. "Once when Miaka and I were 15, we found it in a library and when I read it out loud to her and turned the page, we were transported into the world within the book. Ancient China. Call it magic if you will." He raised an eyebrow at me skeptically and it made me well up with pride inside...by God! Kunio Hirosu was actually listening to ME! Hahahahaha! "While we were there she met Taka, only he was called Tamahome because he had a red kanji that appeared on his forehead. It was the kanji that represents the "ogre" constellation in the sky. She later agreed to become the priestess to the Southern god Suzaku and Tamahome was her seishi because he had the ogre symbol on his forehead. I became the priestess to a different god, Seiryuu, and Shinji was one of my seishi, Suboshi."  
  
"Well, that's nice I'm happy for you, but tell me, what does this have to do with me? I don't plan on becoming a priestess and I didn't have any red symbols on my forehead last time I checked."  
  
"I'm getting there! That was four years ago. Now, somehow, Ishino Kyoko got hold of the book. She turned the first page in Tanaka-sensei's office this morning and now we're here."  
  
"In ancient China? You actually expect me to believe that?" He sneered and twirled his gun. Pardon me whilst I bit the hell outta my tongue again.  
  
"Not really." He snorted at that closed his eyes. "Hirosu, have you looked in the mirror lately?" I smirked smugly, for some odd reason, finding his upcoming predicament funny. Weird sense of humor, ne?  
  
"Why?" Still stupidly smiling I got up and walked over to him cautiously. I braced myself and silently prayed that I wouldn't make a totally idiot of myself as I gingerly touched his cheek where I had earlier seen his kanji. "What the hell are you doing?!" His eyes shot open but that didn't last long because an intense violet glow made him shut them.  
  
"That's why" I struggled to keep a straight face, but inside I was grinning like a madman in triumph. "Kyoko is a priestess and you are her seishi. Your kanji is Mizu." The glowing diminished till it was no more and Hirosu placed his fingers where it had been. "By the way, WHY did you have a gun? In a counseling session, none-the-less!" He struggled to look mean and impenetrable again, but it was too late, and on the inside I was cheering that I had shaken up Kunio Hirosu!  
  
"I take my gun with me everywhere I go," he said simply.  
  
"In the Counselor's office?!"  
  
"I Take my gun with me everywhere I go." This time every word in that sentence was pure threat and I got a feeling if I didn't shut up I'd end up with a bullet in my brain. That's reason enough for me!  
  
"Fine, fine." I sighed in defeat making my way out of the room.  
~*~*~  
I found Kyoko sitting on the palace steps watching people go about their lives without a care in the world. The look on her face told me that she envied them.  
  
"Hey," I spoke up sitting next to her and setting my gaze to the crowd as well.  
  
"Hey, Yui-chan." For a while silence settled in until she broke it with, "I read what all happened last time you two were here. It's amazing how all those bad and evil things you did all originated from one lie." Yeah, real amazing. Just totally breathtaking that because of one lie ten seishi and thousands more unfortunates caught in the mighty Suzaku Vs Seiryuu War were cold and dead in the ground. Just marvelous that because of one lie I slit my wrists, turned on my best friend, and let out a part of me I never ever want to see again. Real amazing.  
  
"I still have those scars, you know." I flipped my wrist over and held them out for her inspection, the long thin white scars standing out proudly. Her eyes widened as she traced them with her finger tips.  
  
"For some reason I was hoping the book was lying about that much. You don't strike me as the suicidal type."  
  
"But you're saying I strike you as the evil, revenge bent type?" I joked trying to lighten the mood, but Kyoko wasn't paying attention anymore. Rather quickly I noticed what had caught her eye. In the middle of the street, two palace guards were chasing around a red headed man who looked and moved suspiciously like...  
  
"Takeru!" It couldn't have been him! Could it?  
  
He stopped cold and searched for the person who had called the name. Though he clearly was, his chasers were unaffected by Kyoko's call and quickly pinned him, stomach down, to the ground.  
  
"Come on," I grabbed hold of Kyoko's shirt and tugged her out into the street behind me.  
  
"Hold him!" Yelled one of the captors, slamming the man's shoulder back in the dirt.  
  
"Takeru! Let him go!" For a second he went limp, the guards beginning to ease, and at seeing his chance, he tried to buck them off again. They still didn't give. Then for about the fourth time that day, believe me it was starting to get on my nerves, I witnessed a flash of a delicate purple light. The three on the ground were absolutely still as well as Kyoko and I. After all, how often is it you suddenly see a purple flash? Wait. I take that back, I've seen it enough times for one day, and wouldn't have been too upset if I never saw another one again.   
  
On the back of Takeru's neck was a bright purple kanji that read "Fire".  
  
"Hi?" Kyoko questioned out loud.   
  
They're playing you now  
Take a bow  
Take a bow ~ Camera One, The Josh Joplin Group  
  



End file.
